Dear John,
Justice Secretary David Lammy has put forward a proposal that would remove the right to a jury trial for most offences in England and Wales, keeping juries for only a few of the most serious crimes.
They’ve framed it as a common sense cost-cutting reform, a way to speed up the courts or clear backlogs, but changes like this are exactly the kind we need to pay close attention to.
They may not look dramatic today, but they create the infrastructure future governments can abuse tomorrow.
I grew up in Northern Ireland during the troubles. When I heard of these proposals my mind went straight to the Diplock courts: judge-only trials created to handle a backlog and deliver faster outcomes, but which became a symbol of state overreach that only fuelled greater division in communities.
And around the world we see how leaders push the boundaries of legal power once those boundaries have been quietly shifted.
In the US, we watched Trump try to install loyalists in the Department of Justice and use legal threats to intimidate political opponents. In Russia, the courts routinely remove anyone seen as a threat to authority with spurious allegations.
We’re not there. Not right now, at least. But the line between a healthy democracy and authoritarianism is crossed long before anyone even realises.
The danger isn’t necessarily what this government might do with judge-only trials, it’s what an authoritarian government could do. And with the far-right rising in strength, we have to be honest, powers created today are more and more likely to be exploited tomorrow.
Many still cling to the idea that “it couldn’t possibly happen here,” but political reality is rapidly unravelling that line of thinking. We should be putting more checks and balances in place, not fewer.
Your support helps us expose threats to democratic safeguards, push MPs to oppose dangerous changes, and make sure the public sees these proposals for what they are. So, THANK YOU.
All the best,
Mark Kieran
CEO, Open Britain
